"Have Character, Don't Be One"

October 26, 2010 Email

This week has been crazy. First off, my last Pday was awesome. It's too bad I couldn't write you all later in the day. We always have a Devotional on Tuesday nights. Of course we had the luxury of having Elder Russell M. Nelson speak to us!!!!ha ha ha...I know you're all jealous but really it was freaking awesome. Most of our district had decided before that we'd sing in the choir(pretty much everyone can sing in it if they want, but not a lot do). We had awesome seats though and Elder Nelson was sweet. He spoke to us about serving God 'til the end. Investment in the mission now, will pay dividends later in life. Blessings will come to those we baptize along with their posterity and we must remember them always. He also spoke a lot about having character rather than being one (it sounded so funny when he said it). As missionaries we are sent to teach people and not lessons and we must always be alert and pay attention to the peoples needs. Our time at the MTC can be compared to a car battery, we are here to charge our batteries....and we need to just keep running. It really was awesome, he actually didn't speak that long but part of his message is that a brief one is usually best.
I also got to see Pat this week, it was awesome. He seemed to be doing awesome and is just loving teaching the Fijian missionaries. Hopefully I can see him a bit more before I leave. I also see Dustin Higginson here whenever I have my TRC. Me and my comp got to teach Nick Blair again yesterday for our TRC this week. It is the last time we will teach in English. I'm pretty nervous about next Monday's TRC now. I haven't mentioned the language a whole lot yet, but its alright I guess. My district is very advanced compared to most in the language. I would say I'm probably in the middle..? maybe..there are 3 or 4 people who I would say I'm better than but our district has like 11 misisonaries so that's not saying a lot. The other new district is struggling quite a bit though. The older Anziani just left this morning so now it's just us two districts(about 20 missionaries). We will get about 20 new Italian missionaries in like 2 weeks though and we're all excited about that.

Dad, we did now about the groundbreaking for the Rome Temple. We were all soooo pumped about it and our teachers are so jealous. I saw the Jensens this week, I had no clue that they were going on a mission so I was surprised when I saw them here. It was fun talking with them though.

On Sunday we had our weekly Fireside for the MTC and Stephan B. Allen spoke. Probably the funniest guy ever, his talk was so fun to listen to. About half our district wasn't able to make it into the main building to watch him speak so we had to watch in the overflow area. It was actually kinda lucky because he spoke about the Rome Temple and had all the Italian missionaries stand up. Since most of us were in the overflow, they had the cameras in that room show us all(so in the main meeting area, where they have huge projectors, so people far back can see, I was just dead center, fist pumping for like 20 seconds. It was pretty sweet. I'm so popular now, but not really.

During our large group meeting(not that large of a group....only like our branch)....a Brother Murphy spoke to us about not delaying a prompting. "the field is white and already to harvest"....sometimes it takes more faith to drop an investigator then to keep teaching them. Elder Oaks "We need to keep our fishing line in the water". There are so many ways to find people, we just need to work hard to find them and to talk to everyone and everywhere.
About the language again Dad...I really don't know a whole lot about teaching the lessons yet in Italian..I mean I know a lot of verbs and how to put some simple sentences together but I'm like that good yet. I'm struggling like everyone, to put it all together in my head and be able to speak the language. It'll come though I'm not worring at all.

Mom, my laundry is going fine and thanks for the clothes you sent. I really don't need anything now, I'm all set. I hope school is going good for the girls. That would suck if Hills team cant go to Cali...last year was fun.

Oh yeah....so I guess Johvan Davis(he lives in the 5th ward, his dad is the guy with one arm and the other one is mangled kinda)...is companions with Chase Gerber..I played football with him when we lived in Sandy.....small world I guess.
Zone Leader is fun...I'm running out of time but I'll write a letter about it and tell you more about it....
By the way....I look like such a loser...I'm the only one who doesn't get Dear Elders.....maybe send a few so I can build up my rep.......(just kidding but really).
Thanks for the emails, I hope Andy is doing well...send me the Seagles address or anyone else you think I might need.

Ciao........